Read The Bleepin’ Manual
♩ Stay on the Beat, Bestie
Look. Music needs to keep its chill in sync — the metronome click, a drum groove, a delay slap, tremolo pulse, an arpeggio, y'know? OnSong handles this with a shared beat clock that's basically always vibin' about tempo, time signature, & where each measure starts. Beat Sync is what gets all the bleepin' components in OnSong to play nice together so you're not a hot mess & can actually stay in the pocket.
One Tempo, One Very Smart Clock
There's literally one clock for the entire app. It knows three (3!) things: the tempo, the time signature, & where you're standin' in the bar — which beat, which subdivision. The beat clock tempo usually gets its orders from whatever song you're playin', but it can also take direction from other internal & external nonsense. These include:
- Song Tempo is the most basic way the tempo & time signature get set when nothin' else is yellin' at it.
- Ableton Link lets you hook OnSong up to other apps or gear so OnSong can stay in beat & phase with Ableton, a metronome app, or whatever you strapped to your wrist.
- MIDI Clock can now hear the difference between each beat & downbeat & use that to update the tempo. Srsly.
- Backing Tracks get processed when played through the AuxDock to figure out their beat grid, changin' tempo as needed throughout the track like some kind of wizard.
Follow The Beat, Baby
Everything in the OnSong® app now bows to the beat clock. Whoever starts first wins & gets to be the boss. For instance, if you fire up the metronome, the downbeat is heard immediately & everything else falls in line like good little soldiers. If you're actively gettin' beat & phase info through somethin' like Ableton Link or MIDI Clock, the metronome will kick in on the next beat & align downbeats to the clock. First in wins. Everything else? Totes follows.
Metronome
This is the most obvious beat clock integration, includin' the count-in. Duh.
AuxDock Atmosphere
This plays a canvas of sound that can be started, stopped & changed with all those changes synced to the current beat. Pretty fire.
AuxDock Pedalboard
What if your guitar effects could stay in sync with literally every aspect of the song? The AuxDock has timed pedals that can set time parameters to musical subdivisions. Quarter, dotted eighth, whatever, all rollin' with tempo changes on: - Delay - Tremolo - Phaser - Wah
AuxDock Chordboard
Anyone can play chords in the song with this bad boy. It uses an arpeggiator & strum system. Beat sync makes sure each chord change & note happens at the right time, not when your fingers get lucky.
AuxDock Drum Rack
Full drum machine alert. It makes sure the groove, fills, & endings land exactly where you'd expect instead of wherever you flailed at the screen.
AuxDock Virtual Instrument
This is a guitar that can strum or pick to the chords in your song. Beat sync keeps everything timed right instead of playin' whenever you accidentally touch it.
The clock only runs when somethin' is actually listenin'. Nothin' is bein' forced to stay in time. Nothin' is tickin' in the background wastin' battery.
Dynamic Tempo & Meter (For When You Get Bored)
A song doesn't gotta be stuck on one tempo anymore. Each section can have its own vibe & the beat clock updates when you jump to a new section:
- {tempo: 72} changes the tempo to the new BPM value. Revolutionary, we know.
- {time: 6/8} changes the time signature meter to 6/8. The new meter starts on a clean downbeat instead of halfway through a bar like an amateur.
- {ramp: 4} glides from current tempo to new tempo over a number of measures, beats, or seconds instead of snappin' to it like a digital monster. Typing just a number = number of beats. Syntax like 1,2 = one measure & two beats. Add an "s" like 2s = number of seconds, ignorin' tempo completely.
These are live changes, not edits! The tempo shifts on everything without rewritin' the song's own tempo file.
Turnin' On Beat Sync
Beat Sync shows up wherever it matters as a small pulsing LED with the current BPM sittin' beside it. The LED blinks on the beat so you can scope at a glance that sync is actually on & what tempo it's groovin' to.
Tap it to toggle that surface's sync. When you do, a chip floats up in the dock — armed, it's offerin' Ableton Link… as the way to share the tempo with other devices, or it's disarmed, confirmin' beat sync is totally off.
Where It Counts (For Real Tho)
When the metronome counts you in, beat-synced instruments stay quiet during the count & start on the first actual downbeat. They don't play along with the count-in & they don't come in late — the first beat is scheduled ahead of time so it lands exactly right. No excuses.
Why It Doesn't Drift Like a Broken Car
Two details do the heavy liftin', & they're worth knowin' cuz they explain why beat-synced audio in OnSong® stays tight while everything else wanders like a tourist:
The clock's grid is anchored to the device's monotonic hardware clock, not some janky repeatin' timer. A timer collects a tiny error on every tick; an anchored grid computes when each beat should happen, so beat ten thousand is as tight as beat one.
Beat-synced audio gets scheduled ahead of time instead of playin' when the tick arrives. The clock knows exactly when an upcoming beat will happen, so a drum hit gets handed to the audio engine early with a timestamp. If the app gets distracted for a sec, the audio is already queued & still lands on the beat.
If somethin' sounds like it's driftin', check if its Sync is actually ON — an effect with Sync off is runnin' on its own rate knob, which is legit & looks identical from the audience, oops.
